The land of champions is what I would like to call Barbados - I would seriously consider living there permanently.
The place I am staying at is awesome, literally 20 seconds walk from the beach. The Carib beach bar and restaurant, which has been the regular watering hole for a heap of Aussies in the area is 15 seconds from where Im staying. And then the nightlife, wow!! St Lawrence and the Gap is only a short stroll and has been massive every night. Although Im loving this lifestyle, its certainly taking its toll on my body.
I arrived in Barbados on the 11th April and managed to catch maybe 15 minutes of the England versus Bangladesh game (which England won of course with a paltry score of 130 odd in the 37th over I think). I am quite surprised to see that most of the games that I have been to are not sold out. The general feel around the Caribbean is that the organisers of the event didn't issue enough tickets to the locals - either way I am still having a ball.
The following day we drove around the whole island in a rented mini-van. We checked out the Crane beach which is apparently the best beach on the island. The water is so clean and clear and so warm, its perhaps several degrees colder than the air which is very warm anyway! We checked out the "Animal Cave" which was kinda interesting, there are some live animal flowers in an underground cave within the water.
I managed to sit through a whole day of cricket and caught the Australia versus Ireland game. Its a shame the Aussies didn't bat first because the day did not last long. There was a massive party afterwards with about 30 Aussies at the Carib beach bar celebrating the demolishment of the Irish.
Saturday, April 14, 2007
Wednesday, April 11, 2007
Texas
This past week I stayed within Austin, Texas - a college town within the USA. Its a pretty funky place, in fact it is known as the live music city of the USA too - there are always live gigs going around.
So I stayed with my mate Joe in Austin and had a great time. We managed to experience some Texican culture, try some Cajun style seafood (crawfish, stone crab, snow crab boiled in delicious spices), sample some fine Texan beer (my favourites are Shiner Bock and Pyramid Apricot) and catch a live band (the group was called Guster, kinda like a mixture of Cold Play and something else, cant work it out just yet).
So I stayed with my mate Joe in Austin and had a great time. We managed to experience some Texican culture, try some Cajun style seafood (crawfish, stone crab, snow crab boiled in delicious spices), sample some fine Texan beer (my favourites are Shiner Bock and Pyramid Apricot) and catch a live band (the group was called Guster, kinda like a mixture of Cold Play and something else, cant work it out just yet).
Thursday, April 5, 2007
New York, New York
Start spreading the news,
Im leaving today
I want to be a part of it - New York, New York
These vagabond shoes, are longing to stray
Right through the very heart of it - New York, New York
I wanna wake up in a city, that doesnt sleep
And find Im king of the hill - top of the heap, blah, blah, blah, blaahhhhhhhhhhhhhh
Ok, so its my own rendition of Frank Sinatra's "New York, New York" but you get the jist. So New York was a pretty cool place, in fact it was great. Everything about is huge. I arrived there on a Saturday afternoon and immediately set off for Times Square. It truly is a spectacle, its kinda like Vegas lights and streets in a more confined area of space with a lot more people. We then went up into Marriot Place into the revolving restaurant for some pretty views of the city at night, great success!
The following day we headed down to Times Square again, but this time loitered around the Broadway area, our intent, to catch a Broadway show. We managed to get discount tickets to a show called "Avenue Q". It was an enjoyable show, not a typical Broadway musical with dancing but it had a theme to it and used some clever props, for instance the use of muppet like characters!
You cannot visit New York without meeting its famous damsel with her pretty golden torch, I of course mean seeing the Statue of Liberty. Having woken at 8am to swing towards Batery Park (downtown Manhattan), Arps, Tal and I bought some tickets to ride the ferry to Liberty and Ellis Island. Unfortunately, due to security (that in itself is a separate post) we could not venture into the statue but instead walked around the outskirts of Liberty Island for a semi decent look at the statue.
I found Ellis Island really interesting. Ellis Island is a 5 minute ferry ride from both Batery Park and Liberty Island and served as an inspection point for all immigrants who wished to reside in the USA. There is much more history behind it than that of course, so if you feel the need (and I suggest you do) google it :)
From there I visited Wall street, Ground Zero (that was a very creepy place) and took a stroll down the Brooklyn bridge. I also visited Little Italy (so little in fact I can't recall anything remotely Italian), SOHO (a nice funky part of town) and then back towards Queens.
Im leaving today
I want to be a part of it - New York, New York
These vagabond shoes, are longing to stray
Right through the very heart of it - New York, New York
I wanna wake up in a city, that doesnt sleep
And find Im king of the hill - top of the heap, blah, blah, blah, blaahhhhhhhhhhhhhh
Ok, so its my own rendition of Frank Sinatra's "New York, New York" but you get the jist. So New York was a pretty cool place, in fact it was great. Everything about is huge. I arrived there on a Saturday afternoon and immediately set off for Times Square. It truly is a spectacle, its kinda like Vegas lights and streets in a more confined area of space with a lot more people. We then went up into Marriot Place into the revolving restaurant for some pretty views of the city at night, great success!
The following day we headed down to Times Square again, but this time loitered around the Broadway area, our intent, to catch a Broadway show. We managed to get discount tickets to a show called "Avenue Q". It was an enjoyable show, not a typical Broadway musical with dancing but it had a theme to it and used some clever props, for instance the use of muppet like characters!
You cannot visit New York without meeting its famous damsel with her pretty golden torch, I of course mean seeing the Statue of Liberty. Having woken at 8am to swing towards Batery Park (downtown Manhattan), Arps, Tal and I bought some tickets to ride the ferry to Liberty and Ellis Island. Unfortunately, due to security (that in itself is a separate post) we could not venture into the statue but instead walked around the outskirts of Liberty Island for a semi decent look at the statue.
I found Ellis Island really interesting. Ellis Island is a 5 minute ferry ride from both Batery Park and Liberty Island and served as an inspection point for all immigrants who wished to reside in the USA. There is much more history behind it than that of course, so if you feel the need (and I suggest you do) google it :)
From there I visited Wall street, Ground Zero (that was a very creepy place) and took a stroll down the Brooklyn bridge. I also visited Little Italy (so little in fact I can't recall anything remotely Italian), SOHO (a nice funky part of town) and then back towards Queens.
Monday, April 2, 2007
It sucks to be sick in Montreal
After a big weekend in Vegas I progressed through to frosty Canada, specifically, Montreal. Let me begin firstly by saying that frosty is a slight understatement, it was freezing. When you are used to temperatures of nothing less than 5 degrees (37 farenheit perhaps?) then going below zero is not much fun. That coupled with being run down and hopping between place to place every couple of days or so spells trouble with the travel bug. And so I got sick, miserably sick.
My time in Montreal was mostly spent sleeping, taking gargle for my throat infection, drops for my ear infection, catching the occasional NBA game on cable and not much else. I did manage to get a glimpse of Old Montreal by night in a car, it is very picteresque and has a very European feel to it. McGill University is another notable attraction with old buildings that are scattered and sitting atop a small mountain overlooking the city.
I would go again, but only in summer...
My time in Montreal was mostly spent sleeping, taking gargle for my throat infection, drops for my ear infection, catching the occasional NBA game on cable and not much else. I did manage to get a glimpse of Old Montreal by night in a car, it is very picteresque and has a very European feel to it. McGill University is another notable attraction with old buildings that are scattered and sitting atop a small mountain overlooking the city.
I would go again, but only in summer...
Sin City
Sin city, also known as Las Vegas is truly a wicked and devious place. The term "anything goes" pretty much sums it up here, I guess the only other place that betters it (in that respect) is Amsterdam.
It appears nothing is taboo here - people handing out flyers for strippers to just about anyone including families, half naked girls dancing on podiums just above the blackjack tables .
Anyway, some people love or hate Vegas, I am indifferent. It is a great place to party - I went to some clubs in Caesar's palace, more notably "Pure" and had a bender of a time. I walked up and down the strip several times, checking out the Bellagio, Caesar's Palace, New York New York e.t.c. But if you do not like to gamble (or are just plain tight like me) then Vegas can get pretty boring unless you just relax by the pool if it's nice weather during the day and party at night!
It is a place one can only truly visit once every 6 months I think...
It appears nothing is taboo here - people handing out flyers for strippers to just about anyone including families, half naked girls dancing on podiums just above the blackjack tables .
Anyway, some people love or hate Vegas, I am indifferent. It is a great place to party - I went to some clubs in Caesar's palace, more notably "Pure" and had a bender of a time. I walked up and down the strip several times, checking out the Bellagio, Caesar's Palace, New York New York e.t.c. But if you do not like to gamble (or are just plain tight like me) then Vegas can get pretty boring unless you just relax by the pool if it's nice weather during the day and party at night!
It is a place one can only truly visit once every 6 months I think...
Thursday, March 22, 2007
Arizona
Arizona is nice. I was staying with my uncle at Lake Havasu City, around 5 hours drive from Los Angeles very close to the border of California and Arizona. The temperature here is brilliant and hardly any humidity so anyone that loves the warm summer weather should seriously consider living here.
Apart from lazing around in my uncle's spa till about 10pm we didn't get to spend too much time there and set off for the 5 hour drive to Phoenix to catch an NBA game at the USA Airways centre. And what a spectacle it was; Suns versus Timberwolves - the game was relatively close for 3 quarters until the Suns stepped up a gear and won the game by an odd 20 points.
Having stayed overnight in Phoenix, the following day we set off for a drive towards the Grand Canyon (another odd 5 hours drive). Our timing was impeccable as we managed to get a glimpse of the canyon at sunset, something that is a must see - we didn't stay too long thereafter as it got pretty close to freezing point at about 8pm at night.
We also managed to hike down part of the canyon, the hike down is fine - but going up is a real struggle, considering I have been stocking up on burgers and not much exercise the last week!
Monday, March 19, 2007
California dreaming
So basically my last two days in LA were spent meeting up with relatives. I had my mum's cousins Danny, Betty and Sean visit us on Saturday. We took the subway to Union Street to Alvero, kinda like "Little Mexico" and had a stroll through the markets and had some "churros" which were kinda tasty. The Mexican culture is quite strong here it seems and I like the latin culture so it was good to hear the music but I missed the dancing.
Saturday night I met with some cousins from my dad's side, Shant and Julian at this trendy club called Chapter 8 in Agoura village LA. It was a pretty cool joint, we had some champagne, beers and tequila shots. The disappointing thing however was that the club closed at 2am, what is up with that man? I mean clubs in Melbourne don't even close sometimes (for example Qbar). It was good to party up in LA though!
On Sunday I hung out with Mickey. We went down to a Porsche dealership and I played the smooth dude and managed to get a test drive in Porsche Carrera 4S convertible, pretty sweet ride. Unfortunately I didn't have the chance to open her up a bit but you can tell it has some gusto behind it.
From there we went to Santa Monica and headed down to a gentleman's spa - the place is called Burke Williams I think. Anyway, it was really cool, it has a steam room, a jacuzzi, sauna and an open fireplace to just chill out. All that was missing was the brandy (or insert favourite drink here) and some cigars.
Right now Im staying with another uncle in Lake Havasu city in Arizona, about 30 minutes shy of the California, Arizona and Nevada border junction. It is a quiet town of around 50,000 people or so, but it still has about 5 different car dealerships (which does not make sense to me). Tomorrow we will be heading to Phoenix to catch the Suns versus Timberwolves game which should be lots of fun...
Saturday night I met with some cousins from my dad's side, Shant and Julian at this trendy club called Chapter 8 in Agoura village LA. It was a pretty cool joint, we had some champagne, beers and tequila shots. The disappointing thing however was that the club closed at 2am, what is up with that man? I mean clubs in Melbourne don't even close sometimes (for example Qbar). It was good to party up in LA though!
On Sunday I hung out with Mickey. We went down to a Porsche dealership and I played the smooth dude and managed to get a test drive in Porsche Carrera 4S convertible, pretty sweet ride. Unfortunately I didn't have the chance to open her up a bit but you can tell it has some gusto behind it.
From there we went to Santa Monica and headed down to a gentleman's spa - the place is called Burke Williams I think. Anyway, it was really cool, it has a steam room, a jacuzzi, sauna and an open fireplace to just chill out. All that was missing was the brandy (or insert favourite drink here) and some cigars.
Right now Im staying with another uncle in Lake Havasu city in Arizona, about 30 minutes shy of the California, Arizona and Nevada border junction. It is a quiet town of around 50,000 people or so, but it still has about 5 different car dealerships (which does not make sense to me). Tomorrow we will be heading to Phoenix to catch the Suns versus Timberwolves game which should be lots of fun...
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
